


A Moment in Grief

by seekersDownfall (serendipitousDescent)



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Adamant Fortress, Angst, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Minor Character Death, Skyhold, Warden Alistair
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 14:31:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5500871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serendipitousDescent/pseuds/seekersDownfall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After Alistair's death at Adamant Fortress, Tabris went to Skyhold to find out just what happened to her lover. The last ten years have changed her, however it was still Morrigan she turned to when she needed a friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Moment in Grief

Perhaps growing up in the Korcari Wilds had given her a greater appreciation of nature and its beauty than most would ever have. Of course, the Wilds were nothing in comparison to this limited garden. Morrigan would have never taken her tea outside of her mother’s hut back in the Wilds, not like how she was currently doing. Not, as it happened, that she had taken a single sip of her tea thus far. It sat, warming her hands instead of her stomach. 

An odd silence fell over the courtyard as Morrigan contemplated drinking her tea. She’d seen a similar spectacle when they’d first seen her, practically nude when compared to the thick green armour this Inquisition wore. However, she had heard of no impending visitors that would stir such a reaction among these people and so she watched, interested to know what the outcome would be. Another strange mount of the Inquisitor’s, knowing her luck, accidentally set loose upon an unsuspecting population.

It was most certainly not.

Later, Morrigan reasoned, she would insist that she’d recognized the Hero of Ferelden immediately. But the truth of the matter was nothing so dramatic. 

It took her long moments to recognize her old friend as Tabris crossed the courtyard with the air of a general, her back as straight as a pole and donned in the iconic armour of the Grey Wardens. A tight contrast to the mix-match of armour they’d all worn on their adventure. But that was ten years past now and that time had worn on all of them in its own ways. An air of professionalism was what it had given Tabris, it seemed. Morrigan didn’t wish to know what it had taken from her.

“Warden,” Morrigan greeted her as Tabris came closer. As if her very presence here didn’t unnerve Morrigan beyond understanding. She finally took a drink of her tea, if only to hide the tightness in her hands.

Tabris sat down beside her on the stone bench. “Morrigan.”

“I take it you came here to measure the Inquisitor’s worth?”

“Officially, I’m here to speak with the Grey Wardens regarding their duties.” Tabris paused, a curious frown embedding itself into her face. “Unofficially, I’m here to talk to Fiona about my research into the Calling.”

There was more. Even if the lilting tones of an alienage elf had entirely disappeared from her, Morrigan could still recognize that look. It was the same look she’d use to wear after a chat with Sten as she attempted to come up with a way to refute his sideways logic. Once she would have demanded to be told immediately, entirely ignoring that the one doing the telling was still searching for the right words. Now she waited.

The Game had taught her more than she’d let on over the years.

And once Tabris would have been unconcerned with possible listening ears. Even when Loghain could have been waiting for them around any corner, she’d spoken her mind and continued on. The consequences be damned.

“Is there somewhere else we can speak?” Tabris asked instead, oblivious to Morrigan’s thoughts.

Morrigan stood, the worn leather of her skirt swirling around her knees. “Follow me.”

It was possible that one of Leliana’s spies had already taken off with a message to the Nightingale herself. Unlikely, unless they preferred to be chastised for their lack of detail. However, they would be getting no more detail from this particular conversation in Morrigan had anything to say on the matter. And she had a lot to say on this matter.

The door to the room that held the Eluvian closed shut behind them but Morrigan didn’t stop until she reached the Eluvian itself. It activated itself with a wave of her hand and she turned to look at the Hero of Ferelden expectantly. After all, Tabris had already been given a display of how it worked. All because the blasted woman hadn’t known when to let things go, even when others had long since put Morrigan out of their thoughts.

“We don’t have to-”

“If you are in want of a private conversation in this keep, than it is entirely necessary,” Morrigan interrupted.

Tabris sighed. “And into the large, magical mirror we go.”

A dry comment sat on the tip of her tongue, waiting to be said. Then Morrigan saw the comment for what it was, the echoes of a dead man ringing through the air, and swallowed it back as Tabris stepped through the Eluvian. Morrigan followed after her, unsurprised to find that Tabris had waited only a few feet away. 

“Come on, this way.” 

Tabris’s face twisted into displeasure. “Isn’t this far enough? I doubt anyone’s going to listen in when we’re in an entirely different dimension.”

“That was not-” Morrigan broke her comment off, staring at Tabris in genuine hurt. This all felt like an old dance, one old enough that she’d long since forgotten the steps. Or perhaps Tabris had been the one who’d forgotten. “I only meant that was a place for us to sit not far from here, so long as you don’t mind the looming statues of Mythal.”

“Oh.”

And that sounded genuine, if nothing else had.

“Yes, _oh_.”

Tabris followed her this time when Morrigan started for the shrine she’d mentioned. It took them barely any time at all to arrive at the overgrown shrine, statues of Mythal standing tall and glorified all around them. At the base of one was an elaborate bench, the markings that had once been carved into it now worn away into nothing. Morrigan sat as she had a handful of times before and waited for Tabris to do the same.

Now that Morrigan was no longer surrounded by those she could not fully trust, she allowed herself a moment to notice just how much Tabris had changed. Her hair was longer, just as Morrigan’s was, and partially tied back in a style that was neither popular nor stylish. Tabris wore darker make-up as well, lending to an air of maturity. Likely to offset the tattoos Morrigan had once found charming. They now seemed childish, the mistake of a girl attempting to emulate a people she had no real knowledge of.

Which was likely seeing into the heart of the matter far more than Morrigan had intended. 

The most noticeable difference, Morrigan noted as they sat in tense silence, had nothing to do with appearances. Tabris had always been able to draw people in, letting them rotate around her much like they rotated around the sun. She had the capacity to lead in a way few others ever had. Morrigan doubted that had changed but before it had felt the simplest thing, a smile and a thoughtful gift bringing forth more loyalty than Morrigan would ever give another. The face of a commander who’d watched the world burn was what she now looked before.

Something broke in Tabris then, as the Warden forced her gaze away with a harsh laugh. “I know, I look like shit.”

“I did not say as much.”

Nor had Morrigan thought it.

As least, not until it had been brought to her attention.

“You didn’t have to.”

A telling statement but one Morrigan couldn’t find an appropriate response to. Instead she waited as Tabris looked at the hazy network of trees and statues around them, likely comparing it to her own interactions with the Fade. 

“Kieran doesn’t have a father anymore,” Tabris admitted, low and hurt.

Ah. 

That was what this was about then.

“Kieran never had a father,” Morrigan countered. “At least not in the way you think of a father. All he knows are stories.”

Leliana would have known how Tabris’s father faired. If the events of the Purging of the alienage had turned out to be too much for him or if he’d supported the newest Bann. Maybe that would have been an unneeded comment to a woman who’d saved both loved ones and the world. For someone who’d then turned her back on all of that not even a week later.

But Tabris had come to her and not to Leliana and while Morrigan would likely never understand that decision, she would never forget it either. Just like a great number of things this impossible woman had said and done. 

“Alistair is dead,” Tabris tried again.

The Warden’s hands shook along with her voice and she didn’t dare look towards Morrigan. But Morrigan had had years to recognize the signs of pain, of grief, of mourning. All of which were present in her oldest friend. Morrigan reached over and rested her hand overtop of one of Tabris’s shaking hands, dutifully ignoring the strength with which it was grabbed at.

“Have you spoken to the Inquisitor? She was present when it happened, from what I have heard.”

Tabris nodded briefly. “I talked to Fiona first. Did you know that she’s Alistair’s mother? He doesn’t - didn’t know - nobody other than Duncan knew - but she told me and said she couldn’t imagine a better partner for him. It’s not true but what was I supposed to say to that? When I wasn’t even there at his side, when there’s not even a body for me to see?”

“A thank you would have sufficed, I’m certain.” The grip on her hand loosened a bit and Morrigan squeezed back lightly. “As for the rest, well, if it hadn’t been this than it would have been something else. Do you really think she would have had a body to mourn when the two of you inevitably journeyed down to the Deep Roads one last time?”

“No, but-”

“But even your work on diverting the Calling wouldn’t have stopped the two of you from rushing head-first into danger. Unless you mean to tell me there was a plan to become farmers in your old age?” 

Tabris worried her lip between her teeth, her gaze growing distant. “Not farmers, no. Before the Conclave, we daydreamed about getting a house in Redcliffe. Maybe having a child or two. We knew it would never really happen but…”

“But it was a pleasant dream all the same.”

“One I thought we were close to.”

A most unfortunate thing it was to place hopes into dreams that had little chance of coming true. Alistair may have been satisfied, at least the Alistair she had known years ago, however Tabris likely would have lasted weeks before taking off into the wind. Perhaps someone would have heard a whisper of her in the years to come or maybe they would have known of her continued existence through faith only. 

Regardless, Morrigan kept such thoughts to herself. In another reality, she might not have. One where Tabris had died and Alistair was the one coming to her for comfort, however unlikely such a situation seemed. Her own grief would have likely set off her temper.

“And what exactly did the Inquisitor say to you?” she asked quietly.

“Not much. I’m not sure what I expected, really. She… apologized for my loss but-”

“But while a great leader for this Inquisition, she often lacks in sympathy, yes. A downfall you never seemed to have.”

“Then Leliana approached me just as I was about to go search for you,” Tabris admitted. “She’s changed so much, I could hardly recognize her as the same person who came to us in Lothering. She brushed off my condolences about the Divine and tried to apologize for the Inquisitor.”

“Saying not a word about your fallen lover then, I presume.”

“No.”

Morrigan had expected as much from the spymaster but they had not gotten along even whilst travelling through all of Ferelden together. A Chantry Sister and a Witch of the Wilds. It had seemed like a cruel joke at the time and perhaps moreso now. At least she knew the dislike was a mutual one and thus no sleep had been lost on either side. 

But that was not a thought for the here and the now. Now she had her dearest friend, albeit separated by years and wars and the possible destruction of world, and that friend was hurting in every way imaginable. It didn’t matter that a mutual acquaintance of theirs had acted callously. It didn’t matter that Morrigan had not approved of the lover Tabris took. It didn’t matter that they were somewhere between reality and the Fade, surrounded by Eluvians that could lead anywhere. What mattered was offering a friend what little comfort she could. 

“You don’t have to wear a mask around me, old friend,” she murmured finally.

“I’m not old quite-”

Tabris had turned towards her and their eyes met for the first time since they spotted one another in the courtyard. It was enough to break the hardened armour Tabris had been wearing around her heart and tears started to leak from the corners of her eyes. Likely for the first time since Tabris had heard the news, however long ago that had been.

Or perhaps even before then. 

Tabris pulled her hand away from Morrigan’s as she touched her tears with the tips of her fingers. The fact that she was crying seemed almost a shock and that was more than enough to inform Morrigan that her friend had not let herself properly grieve her lover’s passing. It was with no little effort that she wrapped an arm around Tabris’s shoulders and pulled the grown woman close, despite the way the Warden’s armour jabbed into her side. 

The quiet tears turned into full-blown sobbing within the minute and Morrigan didn’t say a word. She simply let things be, her thumb moving in soothing circles on the Hero of Ferelden’s shoulder in an attempt at comfort. There wouldn’t be another lover for Tabris, regardless of if her research into the Calling lengthened her life or not. The two of them had always been it for each other. And, despite Morrigan’s disapproval, Alistair had treated her with such love and care that it had been difficult to avoid the stories of their devotion to one another. Even separated as they all were.

That night, when Tabris had fallen into a deep slumber, Morrigan would stay awake. Penmanship had never been one of her strong suits but she would take advantage of it in order to pen a letter to a man in Antiva who found pleasure in killing Crows. She would suggest to him that he be in Ostwick in a month’s time. From there, it would be up to him where he went but she would suggest visiting the Arishok in Par Vollen and perhaps that was where he would end up.

The Hero of Ferelden would sneak around the corners for the next week before she eventually took off in the middle of the night, only leaving behind a brief note saying she wished Morrigan success. 

In what exactly, Morrigan would never know.

“She… wasn’t exactly what I was expecting,” Varric would mutter to her the day after the Warden’s disappearance. 

Morrigan would raise a precisely groomed eyebrow. “And what, pray tell, did you expect from a woman who had the bad luck to slay an archdemon?”

“Well, when you put it like that,” Varric would respond and then he would shrug. “More ceremony, a few less bad jokes, a proper haircut and not as much hanging around dark corners to start. Think I see what Alistair meant about her approving of Hawke though, even if I didn’t at the time.”

“Yes, well, all of that would have been more likely had she not just been a woman. Particularly a woman who has lost more than anyone will ever expect.”

“I see that now. It’s why her and Hawke would have gotten along.”

Varric would wander off then, likely to forget the short conversation. It would stay with Morrigan however, until she set off into the Arbor Wilds and then left it a different woman.

Then she would have more important things clouding her mind.


End file.
